Until You Loved Me (Silver Springs #3)(36)

“Hudson King?” The man’s face registered shock when he realized who’d been causing the commotion.

“This isn’t what it appears to be,” Hudson said. “We’re not fighting, exactly. Not physically, anyway. And I’ll pay for the Sheetrock.” He pulled several bills from his pocket, way more than the repairs could ever cost, and tossed them on the bed.

“I’m more worried about her than the wall,” the guy said.

Hudson raised his hands. “I haven’t hurt her. Tell him I haven’t hurt you.”

“He h-hasn’t hurt me,” she admitted, sniffing and wiping her wet cheeks. “But he could. I want him gone. This is my room, and he’s no longer welcome in it.”

“What?” Hudson said. How dare she act like the injured party? So he’d raised his voice a little. Look what she’d done to him!

“If you leave this minute, we’ll just forget this ever happened,” she said. “Otherwise—”

“Wait.” Hudson scrubbed his face with one hand. She was still going with the “drop everything” approach. But he couldn’t do that, not now. “We still need to talk. Nothing’s been resolved.”

“Yes, it has,” she said. “I’m done. I did what I felt was right, and you didn’t want to hear it, so...we’ll leave it there.”

A new surge of frustration made him feel he was all tied up in knots. So now she was cutting him out? She came here, devastated him, and then...it was goodbye? “But—”

“Mr. King?” The motel manager interrupted before he could argue with her.

“Don’t call the cops!” Hudson lifted a warning finger. “I’m sorry for the noise, but I haven’t done anything except put a hole in the wall, which I’ve paid for.”

“I understand. I’m glad you’re taking care of it. But you’re causing a disruption. And, let’s face it, you’re awfully angry. I can tell your poor girlfriend’s scared to death.”

Girlfriend? That made Hudson want to punch the wall again. “I’d never hurt her or any other woman!” He was irritated that anyone would even suggest it, but neither attempted to reassure him. Hudson got the impression they didn’t fully believe him, which only twisted him up worse.

“If you leave, there’ll be no need to get anyone else involved,” the motel manager said as he gathered the money and backed away again. “Let’s just... Let’s just get you out of here, okay? Look at her. She’s shaking like a leaf.”

Hudson couldn’t help feeling a little shocked when he looked at her objectively. She did seem frightened. He hadn’t done anything too bad, but he realized then that they were reacting to what he could’ve done. She didn’t trust him any more than he trusted her. “She brought this on herself,” he muttered, but he was no longer so sure. That sudden denial of hers at the end, when she’d been saying anything just to mollify him and get him to leave, had stolen the fire from his anger. What if, despite all the unlikely circumstances—including the fact that she’d provided the faulty birth control—this really was just one of those things? A surprise that no one had planned?

Maybe, the night they met, she hadn’t known the condoms weren’t reliable. Maybe she’d been as innocent as she claimed. If that was the case, he shouldn’t have accused her, shouldn’t have shaken her up. But he didn’t know what to think. The realization that he was now facing the very mistake he’d tried his hardest to avoid made him nauseated.

So what should he do? He felt as if she’d driven him into the turf better than any lineman he’d ever faced. His head was swimming so badly he couldn’t get his bearings.

“This way,” the manager coaxed him. “Come on, now. I don’t want any trouble.”

Hudson couldn’t let him call the police. He knew what the media would make of the fact that he’d acted badly with a woman in a motel room. They’d exaggerate everything, paint this little incident as much worse than it was, and then he’d be like all the other guys who’d given professional football players a bad name. He’d sworn he’d never do anything like that—which was why he conceded. “There’s not going to be any trouble. Look, I’m leaving.”

The motel manager backed out of the door as soon as Hudson reached it. The man seemed as scared as Ellie. Given that, Hudson had to admire the way he continued to insist.

At the last second, Hudson stopped and turned to Ellie. He felt he should say something. This had gone so badly. “I’ll call you later, when...when I’ve had a chance to calm down, okay?”

“No, don’t bother,” she said. “I don’t ever want to hear from you again.”





10

Ellie couldn’t pack fast enough. She was getting out of Silver Springs right away. She’d delivered the news. Hudson could pretend it wasn’t true if he wanted to. She was fine with that. She just hated that coming here had ruined her image of him. Otherwise, she could’ve continued to remember their time together fondly.

After she pulled her small suitcase off the bed, she nearly fell herself. She didn’t have her normal strength, needed to eat. She opened the wrapping on the sandwich she’d bought earlier and shoved a bite in her mouth, then checked outside to see if the coast was clear.